


The Night and the Moonshine

by newyorktopaloalto



Series: soon as you're in, you're out [2]
Category: A Series of Unfortunate Events (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post-Canon, Post-Season/Series 03, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-20
Updated: 2019-01-20
Packaged: 2019-10-13 02:16:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17479328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/newyorktopaloalto/pseuds/newyorktopaloalto
Summary: Klaus, more often than not, had to wait for important news to come to him. This letter, another note of continuance for Violet's trial, was just one more piece of their life that he was last to know about and could do nothing for.





	The Night and the Moonshine

**Author's Note:**

> Klaus' POV, and chronologically the second part of the series. 
> 
> Title taken from T.S. Eliot's [Conversation Galante](https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/conversation-galante) (link takes you to poets.org). 
> 
> Don't own, so please don't sue. 
> 
> Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy this part!

It wasn't until the third time they heard about Violet's verdict being postponed that Klaus finally admitted to himself that the High Court had absolutely no intention whatsoever in handing down any verdict other than 'guilty' in regard to the eldest Baudelaire. They, he and Violet, looked at one another over the typeset letter in resignation and, licking his lips, Klaus watched her shake her head at him, lips pursed and eyes slanting down at the children; Klaus understood it best to not say anything about it until later. Sunny, who was more perceptive for her age than most gave her credit for—than, sometimes even Klaus and Violet gave her credit for—glanced between the two of them, a few of her sharp top teeth biting into her bottom lip before she opened her mouth. Violet shot their younger sister a look to try and forestall anything the child might have wanted to say, folding the letter primly and placing it into her dress pocket as she smiled down at Beatrice (who had, as though sensing the tension, stopped playing with the blocks Klaus had scrounged up for her before they had left the island long ago). 

“Klaus?”

“Yes, Sunny?” 

He ignored Violet's eye-roll with an ease—Sunny, who had latched onto this new topic with her usual enthusiasm for solving a mystery, would have just continued to push them to tell her about the letter, and Klaus felt it easier to just giver her a truncated version of the more adult truth that had befallen Violet, and even Klaus and Sunny herself to an extent. 

“What was in the letter?” 

“It was for Violet.” 

“What was in it though?” 

Violet, who nudged Klaus' thigh in admonishment with her toe, still waved away his questioning look with a shrug for good measure; Klaus, who patted the top of her foot consolingly before flicking at her calf in retaliation, turned his attention on the now (shifting from foot to foot, inquisitive in both the best and worst of ways and taken entirely from the best and worst of both Violet's and Klaus' habits—her parents in all the ways that mattered, they were the ones whose personalities she latched onto, putting her own spin on top of it all) impatient child waiting for one of them to answer her question. 

“It was about Violet's trial. It's going to be postponed for a little while longer.” 

As Klaus spoke, he felt Violet's hand slither into his own and he squeezed it tightly, hoping to lend his older sister a little bit of equanimity that he knew she couldn't quite grasp at herself at this moment in time. Though he knew that Violet would deem their roles better reversed—her being both older and bolder—Klaus couldn't help but feel a rush of necessity whenever he saw Violet stumble (he couldn't, in any case, imagine going through his life without trying to help Violet in any way he could, until his fingernails turned bloody, his throat shredded, and his strength sapped from his very marrow). 

“But what does that—” 

“We'll let you know when it becomes pertinent.” 

And maybe as he and Violet got older, as the responsibility of raising children was thrust upon them and they could no longer rely on anyone else to take care of anything other than taking care of their own, maybe they got a little less open with the children, a little more secretive between themselves. But wasn't that, after all, the nature of the transition from childhood into adulthood? While not near the level of ineffectual that so many adults in their lives had resided in, Klaus also knew that their reality was now different than it was, and what was once shared openly with Sunny now felt better shrouded in at least an attempt of a modicum of normalcy. (And Klaus knew that normalcy was nothing more than a paradigm, that one person's 'normal' was someone else's 'abnormal' and that the Baudelaire's normal was nothing like one Klaus had encountered before that wasn't in a lurid, cautionary, or otherwise immoral work of fiction, but he still felt the obligation to do what he could for Sunny and Beatrice—it was something that he and Violet, joint decisions both necessary and an obligation for this new life, agreed unequivocally on). 

“Klaus.” It was a whine, and Violet clicked her tongue at their younger sister, who sighed with a formidable force before making her way to the kitchen to—ostensibly, Klaus was sure—find ingredients to make dinner with, but would actually be doubtless attempting to listen in on whatever conversation they might be engaging in without her. 

He shot Violet a glance he knew she could see in her peripheral vision, and she winked at him in reply—Violet had an air of gravitas that Klaus always was a little in awe of, a little breathless whenever he saw it in action. Klaus, whose heart still jumped in his throat every time Violet's gaze turned sly and dryly amused, let the fingers of his free hand reach up and touch the corner of her mouth where her lips had turned up in a gentle smile as she listened to Sunny stomp about the kitchen. As though startled by the touch, Violet turned to him in a hasty motion; about to take his hand away, embarrassed by a line he didn't think had been crossed, Klaus' hand only was kept in place as Violet reached up to hold it there. They looked at one another—Klaus could feel it the second Violet had ceased to draw breath and he, in turn, let his own escape him (because Klaus couldn't help but want to live in every cliché he could with Violet, bury them both in situations marked by their familiarity and comfort in what he had been vicariously living in for years). 

“Sunny?”

Beatrice, who had clung to Sunny from a young age—there was something, Klaus assumed, about the older child being a sister rather than a parent that made baby Beatrice bond in a manner entirely different than she had with either Violet or Klaus—interrupted whatever moment Klaus had thought he and Violet had been ensconced within, her plaintive cry at being left behind in the living room with only the two teens for company obvious in her tone. 

“You don't want to play with your blocks anymore?” Violet wheedled, sliding from the couch to her knees on the floor with ease. 

Klaus, feeling a little chilled now that Violet had left from her position next to him on the couch, stood up and headed over to the record player in the corner, rifling through the '33s to find one that all four of them would enjoy. Finally, glancing over his shoulder at Violet (her hair was up to help Beatrice 'invent' something new with her blocks, the toddler swayed in her desire to be with Sunny by one-on-one attention from the young woman who was usually away from home and hard at work) as though her back might give him some sort of inspiration, Klaus found himself lingering on a random album as he instead decided to peruse a more interesting avenue of sight. It was only when she shook her head, chuckling at something Beatrice did, that Klaus turned his attention once more to his self-appointed task; Gershwin stared up at him. Though Klaus had not stopped on the American composer on purpose, he couldn't help but feel that little thrill of his own thematic wont (in this instance, pausing accidentally on one of Violet's favorite composers) in play on a more domestic of scales. 

The first notes hit, crackling and popping against the speakers; Violet, despite her weekend tinkering, smiling up at Klaus as he plied her with a sandwich or two as she lost herself in the mechanics of it all, had never been able to figure out if it was the records, the player, or the speakers that made the static. Klaus, who had already pinned his gaze on Violet, was ready with a wink as she turned around to smile at him. 

“Good choice,” she said to him, while Beatrice took advantage of not being watched to try and find a perfect block from Violet's tower to engineer what, Klaus was sure, was most likely to be a masterpiece. Violet's tower, then, predictably fell and Violet's smile turned a little rueful as the little girl proceeded to pilfer through what had fallen and scattered across the floor, still in the hunt for whatever she was looking for. 

“I know,” Klaus replied before closing the cover of the record player with a soft sound. 

“I'm going to help Sunny in the kitchen,” he said after a moment of watching the two of them, his eyes drawn to Violet's gently amused expression more often than drawn to the baby. 

“Okay,” she agreed and, as he passed by her with a brush of his fingertips against her shoulder, she grabbed his hand to buss a kiss against his knuckles. “Thank you.” 

“Of course.” 

He brushed Violet's cheek after she let go of his hand, letting his fingertips linger against it for a moment before his steps took him too far to easily continue on with the motion.

* * *

Later, the lights dim, the dishes washed and dried, the children in bed and asleep, Violet and Klaus settled onto the fire escape; the night was sharp and Klaus huddled underneath a blanket with Violet, shoulder to shoulder, both unwilling and unable to look at one another for this conversation. Difficult conversations, especially when both were in agreement about the one action they didn't wish to take, seemed easier if they didn't have to see the answer in their sibling's eyes—both Klaus and Violet knew this from bitter experience. (Klaus wondered, idly and totally inappropriate for the moment, if any experience could be considered such if it wasn't bitter). 

“I'm going to take the plea bargain.” 

“If you do that, I don't see you being able to inherit.” 

“But you will.” 

“Yeah, in two years.” 

“If this is taken to full trial, it can take longer than that, and then the bank won't do anything until that's cleared up.” Violet paused and Klaus heard her let out a breath. “It's the best option.” 

“I don't like it,” Klaus responded, trailing his hand down Violet's arm until it caught hers, twisting uselessly at the hem of her dress in a nervous tic—he squeezed her hand before bringing them out of the blanket, pressing their knuckles into his cheek, hard, vaguely hoping to leave a tangible mark. 

“I don't either, Klaus.” 

“Violet...” He trailed off, not knowing what to say to her, her future basically ruined and in the writing on the wall and there was nothing Klaus could do, nothing he could read and regurgitate that could help her more than a plea bargain and the hope of a light sentence. 

“We can run away,” he offered weakly, leaving behind their usual agreement by turning to face Violet and, breaking their grip on one another, tilting her chin to the side so she faced him. At first she kept her eyes averted, before she realized Klaus was not going to give up and, with a sigh, looked up to meet his gaze. 

“Not with the children.” 

“Fake our deaths.” 

Klaus watched as Violet smiled a little (the twitch in her jaw made it clear to Klaus that she wished she was able to maintain a neutral expression around him—a fact that he was guiltily glad about and wished for her to never learn to be able to do) at his second suggestion, shaking her head in response and dislodging Klaus' hand whilst doing so. 

“I like it that one, but it seems unrealistic.” 

“We can get new identities. I'll name myself something appropriately literary and we can feast on the doubts of the many social workers.” 

“Did he come today?” 

“He did.” 

“How did it go?” 

There was silence between he and Violet, the wind idling its way through dried-out leaves and dust, as Klaus tried to phrase his earlier day for Violet, to whom social service check-ups were more a myth than a reality. (Klaus supposed that there was an anger there as well—there was for him—due to the simple fact that it took until the teens' ordeal was long over for anyone to, ostensibly, care about what happened to the children at all). With no eloquent way to put the worker's well-meaning, but ultimately trite, sense of care and duty toward the Baudelaires, he shrugged. 

“He didn't say anything?”

“We still have the children and he only admonished me the one time, so we're better than we were after the last visit.”

“That's something at least—isn't it?” Klaus heard the hesitation in Violet's question—the tangled web of both being there and not, Klaus knew, rendering her more cautious than her usual demeanor with anything regarding the children and the miniature of rearing them in accordance with the banking and courts system. 

“It is.” Klaus agreed with more of an ease than he usually felt, with less resentment than he sometimes dwelt in, and altogether about the same level of irritation with the situation than he had since they (the nefarious and mordant Baudelaire orphans returned to their roots at last?) had decided to re-enter society. 

After a moment he stood, the blanket folding itself once more over Violet's shoulders with a flick of Klaus' wrist, before leaning down to press a light kiss on her forehead. 

“I'll let you think,” he said, knowing that they both needed time to think, separate from each other, about the more than likely outcome of Violet deciding to take the plea deal. 

Their solicitor, at the beginning of it all, had informed them gravely that the plea deal was the best they were going to get, that fighting it out in court would take more out of them all than it would be worth in the end, and that nothing, in the end, they would be likely to prevail. If anything, Klaus supposed, they should be grateful that the High Court was filled with bureaucratic nonsense and they still had time, before the hearing, to accept something other than a full trial. They should be grateful... Klaus couldn't feel anything other than a dull fury, more background than anything worthwhile to him after all these years.

“Don't stay up too late—I'll come out here and drag you back in if need be." 

Violet nodded, her eyes already clouded and adrift in whatever thoughts currently plagued her—Klaus figured they were much of one mind in their rumination. He made sure to keep the window open an inch or so, deciding that whatever slight chill came in through the crack was worth it to be able to hear Violet in case she had need of him. 

He checked in on the children, his motions rote from how many nights he had done this very thing, and walked over to the record player—the air was too think to not be listening to something, atmosphere dense and heady and more than a little bit cloying. Stinging in the back of his throat told Klaus it was less his surrounds than his own lack of equanimity, but he felt better railing against nature itself, than against his own fraying emotions. The music was low and he closed his eyes, letting himself fall onto the floor as he leaned against the table the player sat upon; Klaus took his glasses off and rubbed at the bridge of his nose before scooting the few feet over to the mattress on the floor, unabashedly sprawling out against the entire thing as opposed to his unspoken half against the wall. (There was, he presumed, a streak of fervid protectiveness in Violet insisting on taking the side closest to any threat that came their way, but he also knew that letting her do so was nothing more than a trifle to him and something important to her, and so his tacit assent to her actions was negligible in the long run). 

Half-asleep, Klaus lounged and listened to the record play until Violet, nudging him over to the side closest to the wall with a little more force than he felt necessary, settled in next to him. She tangled their legs together, Klaus letting his forehead rest at the top of her head with a sigh, and whispered a 'sorry' as her cold feet brushed against his. 

“'s okay,” he replied, letting Violet pet at his hair absently as she tried to drift off to sleep; her breath, even against Klaus' neck as her motions eventually stopped in respite, helped lull him into sleep once more.

**Author's Note:**

> xoxo


End file.
